For Kentucky women, getting a divorce can have a major impact on their finances and retirement. In fact, the divorce may actually hit women harder than men due to the fact that women statistically get paid less than men and are often put in charge of caring for the children when they are still married.
The Bureau of Labor Statistics has found that women earn about 82 cents for every dollar that men earn. For example, the median weekly earnings for white men during the first quarter of 2017 were $977 while the median weekly earnings for white women were $790. For black women, the median weekly earnings were even lower at $645. Further, women are also more likely to be the caregivers for their children. This prevents them from being able to move up the career ladder and save for retirement.
As such, women may find that they have more financial trouble when they no longer have their former spouse’s income to rely on for living in the present and in the future. This means that a person’s vision of retirement may have to change in order to be possible based on the person’s post-divorce income. Further, this can mean pulling back on the current lifestyle in order to make the future more financially secure.
Because there are many individuals who do not work during the marriage in order to take care of the kids, spousal support may be available to help the non-working parent make the transition to being responsible for his or her own income. A family law attorney could assist with determining the amount in spousal support the client may be eligible to receive in addition to assisting with the division of the former couple’s assets.